Metro (2007)

Heavy rains and people traveling through the city of Mumbai and the credit roll on. “Metro” takes on a wonderful start. The characters are introduced during the credits. I was quite skeptic about watching Anurag Basu’s “Metro” but I have to admit that I enjoyed it.

The story of Metro is of different people and their relations, running parallel and linking to each other.

Ranjeet and Shikha live a loveless marriage. Ranjeet finds pleasure but not love in his colleague, Neha. Neha’s colleague, Rahul loves her and has big aspirations. He lends his flat to his bosses to carry on their sexual escapades and extra marital affairs. Shikha’s Sister, Shruti works in a radio station and is desperate to get married. She is searching for her love through matrimony sites and meets Debu. She is also falling for the RJ at the radio station. Shikha meanwhile finds solace and emotional support in Akash, a struggling actor who’s wife had left him. Shikha also visits her dance teacher, Vaijanti in the old age home. Vaijanti has a teenage love, Amol who visits her after many years and both rediscover their lost love.

The story reads like countless soap operas on television and still is quite simple when you see it on screen. The stories run parallel and at most time interlinking with each other. Anurag Basu has written and directed the movie and he almost gets it perfect where Nikhil Advani failed in “Salaam-E-Ishq”, where Reema Kagti failed in “Honeymoon Travels Pvt Limited”, where Meghna Gulzar failed in “Just Married”. The idea was to show different stories and churn out a single story instead of each story looking like a different episode.

The stories range from a failed marriage, to finding love, to extra-marital relations to long lost love to a humorous spouse finding story. Although most of the stories are predictable, Anurag Basu weaves them into a single enjoyable movie. The pace does not slackens anywhere. There is drama, emotions and humor too.

Kay Kay Menon plays Ranjeet and he plays the character quite effectively of a MCP. Shilpa Shetty plays Shikha his wife. She acts well if not good. Shiney Ahuja plays Akash, the struggling actor. He excels in that small underdeveloped role too. Their story is quite predictable. The end to thier story was not a logical one but maybe a cinematic one.

Neha is played by Kangana Ranaut. All the movies she had done earlier including Gangster and Woh Lamhe, she plays a mentally unstable person or acts like one. Here too she almost goes to that mode. What’s with her playing such a character every time?

Sharman Joshi plays Rahul, Neha’s colleague. After RDB, he plays a small but significantly good role, a person who believes in doing everything to get ahead. Again a predictable plot, a predictable story but again made good by Kangana and Sharman’s performance.

Nafisa Ali plays Vaijanti, Shikha’s dance teacher. She does ok. Dharmendra comes bac after a long time to play Amol, Vaijanti’s long lost love. The director was bold enough to show a kiss between the old couple. Their story could have been given a little more importance and maybe handled differently.

The main attraction of the movie is Irfan Khan playing Debu and Konkana Sen Sharma playing Shruthi, Shikha’s sister. Without them the movie would have been quite heavy with almost becoming an over emotional affair. Both share a good chemistry and it shows in the movie. This is where Anurag Basu excels as a writer.

Look at the scene when Konkana is angry at every male she knows and Irfan takes her to the terrace. He tell her to shout and let the anger out. Watch the scene when Konkana shouts and breaks down. The scene ends on a funny note when Irfan tells her

“Tumhari servicing ho gayi” (Your servicing is done) and this is without the scene losing its impact. Even the climax scene between the two has a comic touch.

The music is good and some of the songs are good too. They gel quite well with the story and thankfully, there was no running around trees. Although it appear quite a new experiment showing the band singing on rooftops, rain and railway station.

Metro explores relationships without making a classic. Its not a classic but at the end of the movie, its still a good movie. Anurag Basu does not crowd the movie and keeps the movie within a descent 2 hours. It is much better than the stories that have come in recent weeks.

I liked the movie and I would rate it at 8/10 even extending it to 8.5/10

Rating: 8/10

Advertisements